


Desire Slowly Smoking

by IneffableAlien



Category: Good Omens (TV)
Genre: Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Alternate Universe - Gender Changes, Aziraphale Has a Vulva (Good Omens), Aziraphale is Not Oblivious (Good Omens), Bottom Aziraphale (Good Omens), Crowley Whump (Good Omens), Cunnilingus, Dirty Talk, F/F, Female Aziraphale (Good Omens), Female Crowley (Good Omens), Heavy Angst, Hopeful Ending, Hurt/Comfort, Ineffable Wives (Good Omens), Porn With Plot, Porn with Feelings, Protective Crowley (Good Omens), Rape Aftermath, Rape/Non-con Elements, Self-Harm, Service Top Crowley (Good Omens), Slow Burn, Traumatized Crowley (Good Omens)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-29
Updated: 2019-11-06
Packaged: 2021-01-06 06:36:37
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 5
Words: 5,772
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21222191
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/IneffableAlien/pseuds/IneffableAlien
Summary: There’s a reason she never touches her, and it’s not what most people might think.A predominantly woman-shaped Crowley would still orbit Aziraphale for just as many millennia, only the motivation might change.Wherein an abused demon fears abusing an angel.





	1. Introduction

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Nnm](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nnm/gifts).

> Title is from "Talking to My Angel" by Melissa Etheridge.
> 
> EDIT: This was a planned one-shot, but people asked for more and I am a sucker for validation lol. I did try to keep it in such a style that each chapter can be enjoyed individually, but it makes more sense if read the whole way through. Thank you so much for your sweet comments.
> 
> (Adding again) I ultimately decided to gift this as a thank you to one of my favorite authors on this site, who has written eloquently on the subject of trauma in her fanfiction. I don't know her personally, I just felt particularly moved, so go check her out.
> 
> Enjoy!

There’s a reason she never touches her, and it’s not what most people might think.

Crowley has been tempting for 6,000 years. Well, it’s kind of her thing, don’t you think? So you might say to yourself, oh, she balks at the idea because to her sex is work, so maybe when you get right down to it, she might not even know what she likes. But you’d be wrong.

Crowley knows how to get people off, and just as well, she knows how to get herself off.

Not to mention, she takes genuine pleasure in a good—well, bad—job well done.

There are certain unfortunate effects of tempting with a corporation most often presenting anything like female. And that is not to say that Crowley hasn’t sadly encountered traumatic events in other shapes. _He_ has. _They_ have.

And those experiences, they were never necessarily any easier, just different; and everyone, people and occult beings alike, processes differing events in various ways.

But this is just one story, about just one of those ways.

Aziraphale was never one for mixing up things like parts or pronouns, not the way that Crowley switches efforts, like some people change their hair. _She,_ beautiful _she,_ has been a near constant in Crowley’s life, those moon maiden curves, her sunbeam smile … a literal heavenly body. _(Oh, that was corny,_ Crowley thinks. _Aziraphale would have loved it.)_

Many nights in the bookshop end this way. Aziraphale smiles shyly at Crowley overtop the rim of her wine glass, cheeks flushed from sulfites and something else entirely. (On a mental roll tonight with the Harlequin Romance prose, Crowley thinks, _Baby, those legs streaming down that glass could never hold a candle to yours.)_ Crowley knows what Aziraphale wants. Crowley knows desires, and she knows she would not have to do any tempting to get there.

Crowley sees in the heart of Aziraphale, exactly how Aziraphale would want it. She can picture it now. Crowley would pluck the glass stem from Aziraphale’s fingers and set it to one side, tumble into the cushions beside her, and drag Aziraphale into her lap with surprising strength (and perhaps a minor miracle) to face her. She imagines digging her red fingernails into the angel’s alabaster thighs (“The Thrill of Brazil,” Crowley’s signature color) and forcing them apart so Aziraphale was straddling her, so they sat heat to heat. And Crowley would coolly lift off her sunglasses, and Aziraphale would gasp and grind down on Crowley as if she had a— well, fuck it, then she would make a cock for her.

Then Crowley would lean in, and her breath would graze the downy baby hairs on Aziraphale’s cheek, and she would say the words: “You want to get fucked tonight, don’t you, angel? You want to be my _good girl.”_

Maybe a little more genderfucky. Make the angel call her “Daddy,” or something.

But Crowley can’t bring herself to do it.

She doesn’t believe it would make Aziraphale Fall. But she believes she could hurt Aziraphale in other, unforeseeable ways. And for that, she would deserve damnation all over again.

Crowley in femme form has been violated in so many ways. But thousands of years’ worth of betrayed consent, in ways both blatant and micro, hasn’t ruined her ability to enjoy sex.

It’s left her afraid to fucking _top._

_She would let me,_ Crowley thinks desperately. _She would let me do anything I want._

_“Let.”_

_She_ wants _to let me._ Crowley wrestles with the dull ache deep in her cunt. _She_ wants _to let me do anything I want. That's literally what she's waiting for me to do, I can_ smell _it._

Crowley can’t.

She is too afraid. She’s afraid of that “let.”

Afraid to accidentally take advantage.

So it’s at that point in the night, yet again.

“Well, angel,” she purrs, pressing her lean body up off the beam she’s been appearing to hold up. “Think it’s about that time. Need my beauty sleep, you know, busy day of bad deeds and all that.”

“Oh,” Aziraphale says, making no attempt to mask her disappointment. “You know,” she tries (she always tries), “you never have to run off like this, Crowley.” She pauses meaningfully. “The couch, or, I could make a bed … you are _always_ welcome to _anything_ here, my dear.”

“Ngk,” says Crowley, “I’ll, ah, keep that in mind, ha! Well.” She pauses in the doorway, flashes a young Brigitte Bardot smile. “Well,” she says, much gentler now, “I’ll see you tomorrow, angel. _Ciao.”_

Crowley disappears into the night.

_Oh,_ Aziraphale thinks.

_Well, maybe in another hundred years._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> xx [siliconealien](http://siliconealien.tumblr.com)


	2. Retelling

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> a) **MAJOR TRIGGER/CONTENT WARNING FOR RAPE.** Literally that's all this chapter is. You have been fairly warned.
> 
> b) I'm so sorry to readers. I know you all asked me to continue this so there would be some happy ending, but this happened, and also I don't believe the story arc that I started can achieve a satisfying happy ending without first providing more context for Crowley.
> 
> c) I'm so sorry to Crowley.

Crowley hates everything about the word “let.”

She is playing it up some. Rohypnol can actually only wreak so much on her demonic constitution. But it does take the onus off her having to continue brandishing her superb acting skills.

Crowley is excellent at her job. Much of her job is playing pretend.

This is fine, because it’s just part of her job, at which she is excellent.

Tempting one already so inclined to commit evil? A cakewalk. Lying still and letting him? Ehh—as nice as it would be to grab the heavy lamp next to the mattress on the floor and bash her attacker’s brains in with it, this is undeniably, objectively, less work.

Crowley is excellent at her job. Much of that means working smarter, not harder.

She is demonstrating far more efficiency than what you’ve been shown up until this point. The concept of “craftsmanship” is such masturbatory tosh. Securing souls is a numbers game.

In spite of everything, when the cell phone finally comes out, Crowley smiles. She can’t help but feel a touch of pride.

Snapchat was one of hers.

Crowley is excellent at her job. She is the motherfucking Architect of Original Sin, you think she can’t handle one more measly fucking assignment?

Distantly, she wonders how many have been damned to Hell so far, just by watching her and doing nothing.

Crowley is excellent at her job.

_This is fine, this is fine_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> xx [siliconealien](http://siliconealien.tumblr.com)


	3. Rejection

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Major trigger warning for self-harm.

There’s a reason she’s been breaking her heart for thousands of years, and it’s not what most people might think.

Aziraphale knows Crowley loves her, it isn’t that, even if they never speak the words. Love flows off of Crowley; not in waves, which are redirected by storms, but in swells maintaining course and expanding continuously regardless of tries at influence. Such love purifies like the salt of the sea.

She knows Crowley wants her (and it dizzies her, how much she wants Crowley). Crowley’s desire crashes on the quartz of Aziraphale’s shores, and since it’s been going like that for millennia, every pebble is rendered smooth as river glass, made shining so that maybe one day Aziraphale might see herself as beautiful as Crowley does.

Aziraphale is patient. Yes, she’s hedonistic for an angel, but she knows that the finest pleasures are worth the wait.

Crowley has been breaking Aziraphale’s heart for thousands of years—but her heart breaks _for_ her, not from want of her.

It is a terrifying thing to love someone who has the propensity to harm herself.

Sometimes, when Crowley becomes self-destructive, she hides from Aziraphale; or, quite possibly, she becomes self-destructive _when_ she hides from Aziraphale. She disappeared in 1967. In 1970, Aziraphale tracked Crowley to the United States—Ohio, of all places—and found her sobbing in a corner of her apartment there. Her wings bore patches unlike the appearance of ordinary molting, and when Aziraphale raced to gather Crowley in her arms, her fluttery steps stirred the broken feathers on the floor so they took flight one last time.

_(“If I dig deep enough, do you think I’ll find some that aren’t burnt?” Crowley had wailed, a manic gleam in her eye. “What if I ripped my scales off? Could I start over as something forgivable?”)_

Aziraphale had held Crowley and rocked her, maybe for hours, maybe for days, until Crowley either fell asleep or just sobbed her throat too raw to make sound anymore.

So yes, Crowley has broken Aziraphale’s heart wide open, feasibly 8,000 times as easily as once.

But every time Crowley is in a position to break Aziraphale’s heart, Crowley has a tell.

It’s the scent.

Aziraphale adores Crowley’s natural perfume, wishes she could bathe in it. Crowley is bergamot, vetiver, cracked pepper. She still smells like that when something is strangely, horribly off, but the stereotypical sulfur stink of evil follows close behind. What Aziraphale can’t discern is the context. Does the smell mean Crowley was called to Hell, and she doesn’t want Aziraphale to know but the psychological effects are too obvious? Or maybe it means she was threatened by some other demon?

Tonight, they are in the bookshop again, and they are drinking, and sulfur smell riddles the air.

When the smell hangs, there’s a fifty-fifty shot that drinking will cheer Crowley up, but right now the odds do not appear to be in their favor. Aziraphale doesn’t like how fast Crowley is drinking, how quickly she moved on from wine to whisky. Those are tells, too.

“You know,” Crowley slurs, grin too wide for her face, “sometimes I don’t give myself enough credit. I am excellent at my job, you know that?”

Aziraphale narrows her blue eyes slightly. This is new, this is not Crowley crying and beating herself up (often literally), but Crowley is generally not too proud of what her job really _is._ Aziraphale is not sure where this is going.

Aziraphale ventures for diplomacy: “You rarely give yourself enough credit for anything, my dear.”

Crowley freezes where she is sprawling on the couch, golden eyes caught on Aziraphale like she could hypnotize her _(she could,_ Aziraphale thinks). Aziraphale wonders at the sudden shift in the room.

Crowley leans in close to Aziraphale. Takes the glass out of Aziraphale’s hand. Sets it on the desk.

“Crowley?” Aziraphale says, exactly as gently as she would if Crowley were weeping.

“You don’t have to _ssssit_ so far away,” Crowley purrs, but there is something dangerous in it. She tugs Aziraphale’s wrists, and Aziraphale goes easily into Crowley’s lap. Aziraphale can’t help but let out a little moan.

Their foreheads are touching, and Aziraphale is staring at Crowley’s lush mouth, and _God_ she doesn’t care if that was blasphemy but Crowley’s claws gripping up Aziraphale’s thighs and running down her back feel like heaven.

But that smell.

_“Ssssweet_ angel,” Crowley hisses. Her aquiline nose nudges Aziraphale’s cheek, her pointed teeth nip at her ear. _**“Why have I never shown you how good at my job I can be?”**_

And there it is. Aziraphale’s heart crashes down through every floor of a skyscraper of glass.

“Crowley,” she says in a rush of breath, “Crowley, my dear, please look at me. _Look at me.”_ She crawls off of Crowley’s lap and settles in next to her.

Crowley’s head snaps back, and she is on the edge of tears. “You don’t want … ?”

“I don’t know what happened to you today,” Aziraphale whispers, “but something happened to you at work, it’s obvious.” She strokes Crowley’s cheek, tucks a fiery curl behind one ear. “I want it … but I don’t want it like this, dear heart.”

“Right,” Crowley says, standing so fast that Aziraphale jumps. “Of course you don’t want it like _this,”_ she gestures down at herself. “‘Foul fiend,’ an’ all that.”

“What?? No!” Aziraphale exclaims. “That’s not what I meant!” She pleads, “Crowley, _wait!”_

Crowley slams the door on her way out.

Aziraphale doesn’t know how to heal wounds like this.

She asks herself, what kind of a fucking failure of an angel is she, if she can’t heal the one she loves the most?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I decided to add this note because I know there are a lot of young readers on this site, and because the reference was intentionally left vague:
> 
> It is implied here that, unbeknownst to Aziraphale, Crowley was present for the Kent State massacre of 1970--when the Ohio National Guard killed four college students, and wounded nine (leaving one of those nine permanently paralyzed), **all unarmed,** during an anti-Vietnam War protest.
> 
> Whether or not Crowley accidentally contributed to the event while on assignment is up to interpretation.
> 
> xx [siliconealien](http://siliconealien.tumblr.com)


	4. Reconnecting

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Everything is going to be okay.

The world isn’t supposed to end for another five years, but Crowley feels like it ended months ago.

For three months, Crowley has not gone to the bookshop, hasn’t called. For three months, Aziraphale has gone to a certain bench in Berkeley Square at 9 PM precisely. She stays for exactly one hour. During that hour, tendrils of pastel energy climb Crowley’s residential building in Mayfair like so much ivy. The energy is soft as mink, but purposely makes itself known. The energy says, _I promise to be here, at_ this _time, in case you need me to be here,_ and also, _I promise to leave, at_ this _time, in case you need me to go away._

When Crowley gets like this, routine is vital. Something Crowley can have faith in.

Aziraphale will not force her way in. She will not violate this space of Crowley. _(Space of Crowley’s? Seems more grammatically correct. But no, it is a space built of pure Crowley. And Crowley deserves to have that.)_

If this starts to be 1970 all over again, she will have to break in. It hasn’t gotten near that point.

Aziraphale quiets the “yet” hanging from the gallows places of her mind.

Demonic energy creeps, like shadows, like things seen out of the corner of your eye when you wake up at 3 AM for no reason (but Aziraphale has never been afraid of the dark). Sometimes it burrows deep inside Aziraphale’s energy, where it seems to warm its blood. Sometimes it comes wrapped in something green and earthy, and this makes Aziraphale smile, because she pictures how Crowley must be sitting and cuddling (Crowley would never use that word) a little potted plant that has pleased her and now serves to make her feel less lonely. Sometimes Crowley’s energy rears back and hisses a hearty fuck-you.

_I’m terribly sorry, my dear,_ Aziraphale answers when that occurs, _but I just happen to be sitting here for the next hour, and you shall just have to accept that I have every right to be out here._

(It’s a razor-fine line, respecting the wishes of someone who occasionally says “get lost” when she most means “find me.” Or someone who says, “I want it, so touch my body,” and means, “I don’t want it, but numb my mind.” That is why Aziraphale only gives it the one hour.)

At least they catch glimpse of each other every day at work.

It comes as absolutely no surprise to Aziraphale that when Crowley talks to her again for the first time, Crowley and Aziraphale are nowhere to be found.

Nanny Ashtoreth and Brother Francis are watching little Warlock Dowling play in the garden, which is always overrun with birds that the gardener ignores yet seem to cause no damage.

They are on “opposite sides,” of course. They usually don’t speak. They usually don’t stand this close to one another. But even when they stand apart, Warlock, who is days away from his sixth birthday, senses there is a pattern to their separate paths, an orbit they both inhabit (not that he would be able to put any of that into words if asked).

The closer they come to submitting their respective resignations, the more pretense they drop.

Nanny speaks first.

“She misses her.”

She misses her like the new moon misses the sun. She misses her like grass needs rain. Obviously she won’t say anything like that.

Brother Francis grins broadly, and Nanny Ashtoreth wonders how it is that she wants to knock his dumb Chiclet teeth down his stupid throat, but like, affectionately, you know?

“Well,” says Brother Francis, in that horrible West Country accent, “she sure hides it, mightn’t you say? From what my friend tells me, she goes down Mayfair every night, but she never gets let in.”

Nanny Ashtoreth wants to snap at Brother Francis to please stop talking like that for Satan’s sake, but she swallows her annoyance. Instead, she says, “Well, she’s never been too good at that. Letting her in.”

“Oh, believe me, I know,” Brother Francis says solemnly. The pair are silent for a moment.

Brother Francis is back to his ebullient self again. “So what is it, does this make her less a-feard then, letting her friend do all the talking?”

“Something like that,” Nanny grumbles, hunching her shoulders and crumpling her black tweed jacket in on itself.

“In any case,” Brother Francis chuckles, “you tell her, that I have it on good authority, that it will never matter how far backalong it’s been since they saw each other. She will _never_ push her away,” he says, “and she will _never_ not love her.”

Nanny pushes her sunglasses farther up her nose with a trembling smile. She wants to ask about that word, “love.”

Before she can work up the nerve, Brother Francis is calling out to the child, who has just moved a slug out of direct sunlight and to damp soil beneath a bush. “Proper job, Master Warlock!”

“Warlock, dear,” Nanny interjects, although her heart’s not in it—“any living thing that is too pathetic to take care of itself, is certainly of no use to you.”

Brother Francis breaks the accent, murmurs, “A bit on the nose there, my dear girl, wouldn’t you say?”

“I’m sure I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Nanny sniffs.

“Right,” says Brother Francis. “And your friend doesn’t torture plants when she’s really mad at herself.”

_“I do not—_ **hnngh!!”** Nanny growls.

Brother Francis smiles beatifically. Nanny Ashtoreth can’t tell if the setting sun reflects off of him, or if he radiates his own warm glow. He is an ugly man, almost anyone would agree, but right now he is perfect, at least in Nanny’s eyes.

“So,” says Brother Francis, “what do you think? Will your friend let her in tonight?”

Nanny Ashtoreth’s breath hitches.

“Please,” Nanny whispers, “there is nothing she wants more.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know that I missed an opportunity to play with Nanny Ashtoreth's and Brother Francis's genders and individual styles. It _would_ have made sense to change them, since Crowley enjoys multiple genders and Aziraphale doesn't particularly. I kept them as the source for several reasons, but maybe they'll switch things up in some other story :)
> 
> xx [siliconealien](http://siliconealien.tumblr.com)


	5. Being Known

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _Aziraphale knows Crowley. She knows how Crowley unconsciously lives all-or-nothing, and she is not the least bit taken aback—but she_ is _absolutely fucking_ thrilled_—to find herself pinned against the arm of the couch, with Crowley kissing her deeply._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **WARNING that this is the smut chapter!!**
> 
> When I wrote the first chapter of this as a one-shot, I actually wanted to write smut but all I could get out of the characters at that point was angst.
> 
> **If you don't like porn in your fic, I think that the last chapter makes for a decent happy ending all its own.** The smut in this chapter is no joke; the file on my computer is six pages, and over half of that is just these two soft babes getting it in detail. I think that they earned it after all I put them through.
> 
> This was actually a very sweet story to me and I did not expect to get so attached to it, but I do think that their journey ends here. Or at least for the time being :)

There was a conjunction of Venus and Jupiter that year, on this night, days away from Warlock Dowling’s sixth birthday.

In astrology, Jupiter can denote the eternal search for truth, and risk-taking. Jupiter smiles on those who ask questions.

You probably already know what Venus rules.

If you think it silly to take this under consideration, do recall that Aziraphale loves her books of prophecy, perhaps as much as Crowley loves her stars.

It’s raining.

It is that time again, and Aziraphale is preparing to go to Berkeley Square, to reach up and out to her demon. “Nanny” did tell “Brother Francis” that Crowley would let Aziraphale in tonight, after all; it’s been months of Crowley sulking and hiding herself away, in the sort of aloneness that translates into lonely. Aziraphale silently appeals to Her for this to come true, and she could not care less if She has a problem with that.

Regardless of what Crowley thinks and says, Aziraphale does not believe in a God who does not love Crowley.

It is a booster to her faith then, that the second Aziraphale closes her prayer, she feels Crowley before she sees her—her energy a cloud of anxious static which carries scent notes of Earl Grey, rich soil, and home. _Petrichor,_ Aziraphale thinks, imagining the rain outside pounding down on Crowley’s earthy musk. _Such a lovely word._ The door to the bookshop is never locked to Crowley, but Aziraphale still runs to fling it open wide.

Crowley is gripping either side of the doorframe, panting like she ran, too, and forgot that she doesn’t need to pant (or physically run, technically). She is soaked to the bone, like she forgot that she doesn’t need to get wet. And suddenly Aziraphale is drenched, too, because she immediately drags Crowley into her arms where they stand holding each other close. Crowley steadies Aziraphale’s arms and pulls back enough that they can truly see each other. The door is polite enough to lock itself behind. (The gramophone is gracious enough to provide music; Aziraphale has no idea who Lizzie West is, but that doesn’t stop it from deciding on “Chariots Rise”—when it’s right, it’s right.)

They are dried by Aziraphale’s celestial miracling, and Crowley is warmed by Aziraphale’s heat, rather a more human mechanism. When Crowley’s face is still wet, Aziraphale knows that this is from tears. Crowley dropped her sunglasses on a side table almost the moment she came through the door, and her amber eyes are enormous and exposed.

It has only been three months. Crowley and Aziraphale have at times in the past gone without communicating for nearly a century, or even longer. Aziraphale wonders, when did the invisible line that connects them cease to remain elastic?

Aziraphale holds Crowley by the arms, too, and they barely give up a centimeter between their forearms slotted together while Aziraphale guides them to the couch. They let go when Aziraphale drops them down to the cushions, and that is only so that Crowley can face the back of the couch and coil herself small against Aziraphale’s plush body.

The angel’s smile dances in her eyes while she strokes the tight, lanky frame beside her. “I thought that I was coming to you tonight, my dear.”

“Mmf,” Crowley says eloquently into Aziraphale’s hip. “I wanted to come home.”

Aziraphale tilts her head back, drinking in those words, really _hearing_ them.

Aziraphale could say, “I missed you so much.” She could say, “Did you want to talk about it?,” or even, “What were you thinking, leaving me to worry like that??” But more than words, Crowley needs stillness, and permission to breathe, and to know that it can be okay to say or do nothing. So instead, Aziraphale works her delicate hands up through Crowley’s thick crimson waves so that she’s scratching her scalp, massaging little circles there until Crowley whines, incoherent and precious.

Crowley uncurls on her own accord and sits atop her crossed legs. She drops her head into Aziraphale’s open palms and wraps her slender fingers around Aziraphale’s wrists. Aziraphale idly plays with the hair at her temples. She folds her legs beneath her like she’s Crowley’s mirror. Crowley lifts her gaze into Aziraphale’s eyes; Aziraphale’s eyes are always stormy and blue as Crowley’s thoughts. Foreheads touching, “I’m sorry,” Crowley says.

Aziraphale could say, “You don’t owe me any apology.” She could say, “It’s okay,” or, “For what?”

She settles on, “I love you.”

Crowley hisses inward. Her hands grab hold of Aziraphale’s pale mermaid-long curls as though they’re about to prevent her from drowning. _“Don’t,”_ she croaks, “I don’t deserve that.” The words are so close to Aziraphale’s mouth that she feels the breath on her lips.

“I adore you,” says Aziraphale, easily, like that is that.

“You don’t _adore_ me,” Crowley grits out, “I’m a demon, you don’t use that word—”

“I worship you,” Aziraphale continues, without a trace of fear, nor does she sound like she means to make a rebellious point. No fist-shaking at the sky.

Simple. It’s simple. One plus one, two devotees kneeling at the altars of each other.

Crowley sobs, and that’s just too much, one sob is escaped and after that she can only keen and quake and dig her nails into the meat of her palms around Aziraphale’s hair. Their faces are so close that Crowley’s fluttering lashes paint Aziraphale’s cheeks with tears. She spirals on, “Why, angel, I’m fucked up, why, I don’t know what’s wrong with me, why—”

Aziraphale knows Crowley. She knows how Crowley is unconsciously hurting herself, and she reaches for Crowley’s hands to release her hair and jerks them to her chest. As she does, she dives and catches Crowley’s lips with hers. She tastes the sea salt of Crowley’s crushed whimpering mouth.

Three very important things just happened, one right after the other: first, Aziraphale told Crowley that she loves her for the first time. Next, Aziraphale kissed Crowley for the first time. And third, when Aziraphale kissed Crowley, Crowley _remembered._

Crowley feels like a switch has been flipped inside her brain.

Nobody can choose in a split second to be “all better.” But maybe they can choose, in a split second, to not be a victim.

Crowley _remembers_—that she is strong, that she is smarter and braver than any other damn demon she has ever known, and she is the fucking _Serpent of Eden._

Aziraphale knows Crowley. She knows how Crowley unconsciously lives all-or-nothing, and she is not the least bit taken aback—but she _is_ absolutely fucking _thrilled_—to find herself pinned against the arm of the couch, with Crowley kissing her deeply. Crowley is easily six feet tall when not slouching, and Aziraphale arches up with a soft cry under that full length. She scrambles to hold tight onto Crowley’s back, and she gasps when Crowley drives one knee up and grinds it between Aziraphale’s thick thighs.

“Oh, _fuck,”_ Aziraphale moans.

“Ohh, _fuck—ssssssssay_ that again,” Crowley demands in Aziraphale’s ear. “Say that word for me again.”

_“Ffuuck, yes,”_ Aziraphale purrs, pressing into Crowley, making a little show of fighting back. “Dearest, beautiful, you didn’t think I knew that word, did you?” Aziraphale teases.

Crowley makes an indecipherable sound. She reaches behind her to grab Aziraphale’s wrists, and she slams them on the couch above Aziraphale’s head. She wraps her long fingers so she grates both wrists together in one hand, and her free arm snakes between Aziraphale’s breasts, unbuttoning her blouse. Crowley’s kisses fall sweet all around Aziraphale’s décolletage. Aziraphale wonders at the way Crowley is strong enough to hold her there in one hand, pictures a snake constricting its prey: all muscle and bone.

“Beautiful,” Crowley growls, with a little laugh beneath it, “you naughty, fucking, beautiful _brat_ of an angel.”

Crowley practically laps the inside of Aziraphale’s mouth, and she’s let her tongue go forked without realizing. _Pecan divinity,_ Crowley thinks to her own amusement, _that’s what that is—I can’t believe her spit tastes like fucking pecan divinity._ “I’m going to find out what the _resssst_ of you tastes like,” is what Crowley says out loud, low and throaty.

The sound Aziraphale makes then is golden crystal in Crowley’s ear. “Please,” she pleads, and if that isn’t the most charming thing Crowley has ever heard.

Crowley drops Aziraphale’s wrists, and how the Hell did Crowley fall to her knees on the floor so quickly? Crowley reaches up and twists Aziraphale by the waist into a sitting position. Aziraphale paws at Crowley’s hair hungrily, voice thick with heavy sighs and choked breaths. “Please …”

Crowley doesn’t need to miracle Aziraphale’s clothes off. The angel wears an ankle-length A-line skirt, and Crowley bunches the camel-colored fabric and hitches it up to Aziraphale’s waist like an offering, holding it out until Aziraphale grabs hold of it herself, exposes herself. Nor does Crowley miracle away her panties. Where would be the fun in that?

_White cotton,_ Crowley thinks when she yanks them down. _With the little bow, of course they’re the kind with that stupid little bow, she’s so stupidly sexy …_

“‘Please’ what? You have to tell me, princess,” Crowley says through teeth that are too sharp. Her eyes look dark as whiskey in the low lamplight of the shop. Aziraphale is _dripping_ already, Crowley has the upper hand to play.

_“Please,”_ Aziraphale begs. Crowley thinks she can see tears springing from the corners of the angel’s eyes from sheer corporeal need, and oh, isn’t that fantastic …

Crowley nips the inside of where one snow-soft thigh meets the mound _(Yeah, parts of this corporation have definitely never seen the sun,_ Crowley thinks), and when Aziraphale shrieks, Crowley drops her chin onto one of her knees, peers up at the angel with a frown. “‘Please stop’?” Crowley says, mock concern in her furrowed brow. _“‘Prithee desist, oh, Tempter of Eve, turn not this Warrior away from the Light’—_ **hmf—”**

That’s about as far as Crowley got before Aziraphale grabbed her by the hair and shoved her face into her crotch.

_Okay, I can work with that,_ Crowley thinks.

Not to be outdone in roughness, Crowley sinks her nails into Aziraphale’s inner thighs and slams her legs fully spread against the couch. Crowley runs her hands back from Aziraphale’s knees in toward her … what? When Crowley thinks of her own corporation’s anatomy, she thinks in terms of cunt, gash, hellhole … but _this,_ this is the stuff of romance novels. _Her “sex,”_ Crowley thinks cheesily. _It’s flawless. Quite the effort, really._

For the first time since before Aziraphale kissed her, Crowley moves slow. She is not teasing anymore—she’s _basking._ She places a long, lingering kiss on the halo-yellow curls of the angel’s pubic mound, and Aziraphale is trembling so hard that Crowley half-thinks she might vibrate right off the couch and into a puddle on the hardwood.

_Hopefully I can get a puddle or two out of her,_ Crowley thinks.

_“Crowley,”_ Aziraphale practically squeaks.

“Did you just squeak?” Crowley is thrilled.

_“Nngh,”_ says Aziraphale.

“Did you just make a _me_ noise??” Crowley is delighted.

Before Aziraphale can make another sound or grind herself back onto Crowley’s face, Crowley does a minor miracle to trim her fingernails and slips a finger inside her.

_“Fuck,”_ Aziraphale forces through her teeth.

“I still love hearing you say that,” Crowley says with a smile, “but I didn’t really do anything yet.” Crowley noses her way down to where her finger is crooked inside the angel and drags her forked tongue deeply up the length to her clit. Crowley’s senses of taste and smell are both strongest on her tongue, and her eyes nearly roll back in her head at that first lick. _“Good God,”_ she moans into Aziraphale.

Neither of them is in any position to notice or comment on Crowley’s choice of phrase.

Aziraphale is fisting the hair at the crown of Crowley’s head, and she is desperately trying to buck herself harder onto Crowley’s mouth. But every time she tries, Crowley darts back off her quick as a cobra. _“Sssstay,”_ she commands. When she glances up at Aziraphale, the angel inhales sharply—when was the last time she ever saw Crowley’s eyes go pure snake like this, since the wall? _“We go at_ my _sssssssspeed …”_ Her tongue flickers in the air.

Aziraphale whines, lower lip quivering, but she ceases grinding as she’s told.

_“Good …”_ Crowley hisses. She slides a second finger into her angel’s perfect blonde pussy, closes her eyes and feeds like her life depends on it. From the noises Crowley makes, you would think _she_ was the one getting eaten out, or possibly, that she was eating something extravagant, strawberries and crème brûlée.

_No, it would have to be something wilder, more “real,” not like something you get someplace fancy—beignets,_ Crowley thinks deliriously. _Her mouth tastes like divinity, American candy, and her pussy tastes like fucking beignets and chicory café au lait._

“I want _thissssssss,_ angel,” Crowley purrs richly around taunting licks and pinprick bites. _“Issss_ it mine? Can I have it?”

“Yes,” Aziraphale sobs, _“it’s yours …”_

Crowley licks, and nips, and thrusts her fingers deep, and occasionally stops just long enough to be obscene. She says things like, “I want to throw you down on the hood of the Bentley and eat you under the night sky until you flood my _face.”_ She says things like, “I’ll try out being ‘male,’ and I’ll fill you, and I won’t let you clean up, and I’ll take you to the _Ritzssss, **and you’ll feel me dripping out of you …”**_

Aziraphale is delirious in her thoughts, too. There are several seconds where she is intelligent enough to think words, and when she does, it goes something like, _What is this thing, where she’s in charge, and it’s dark, didn’t you know she was dark she’s a demon but it’s good her dark is good she is dark and it’s so good_

And Crowley’s mouth won’t stop, and her fingers won’t stop, curving and gesturing in toward herself from where they are buried deep inside Aziraphale

_(There is a cheat that every young demon learns, you just trace the Enochian alphabet with your tongue)_

and Crowley’s free hand is climbing up over Aziraphale’s tender belly, her fingers spread in a sign of “grab me,” and Aziraphale tears one hand away from Crowley’s hair and entwines their fingers so she can pull Crowley’s hand to her mouth and kiss the back of it and moan hot and heavy into it—

_(you just have to be careful what you spell or you might burn somebody)_

Crowley realizes she is weeping. She loves this angel so much.

Her mouth is burning a little. It’s fine, it’s not deadly, it’s not holy water, it’s more like taking a sip of tea before it’s had time to cool off. Crowley will happily burn like this every day, anywhere on her body, any time the angel wants.

Crowley’s eyes are watering, and her mouth is on fucking _fire,_ and when she hears the shooting star sound of Aziraphale’s great moon-white wings unfurling above them like a shield she knows that _she’s done a blessed good job._

Crowley slithers into the seat beside Aziraphale and pulls the angel into her arms, tucking her head against Crowley’s thudding chest and draping one angel wing over the back of the couch. Aziraphale pants and grapples at Crowley’s button-down shirt as if that will keep her locked down to earth just so long as she holds on tight enough. When Crowley snaps her fingers, a warm weighted blanket finds itself around Aziraphale. Crowley nuzzles the top of Aziraphale’s head and peppers it with kisses like flowers for a crown. She draws her knees up and lets them splay a bit so that Aziraphale is nestled between them; all of Crowley’s body is a cradle for _her,_ beautiful _her._

Crowley lifts her chin. Kisses her once, unbelievably chaste after what just happened.

“I didn’t say it back,” says Crowley. “When you said it, I—”

“You’ve been saying it,” Aziraphale mumbles dazedly, “for 6,000 years.”

Crowley presses her lips to Aziraphale’s forehead.

After a moment, Aziraphale says, “I didn’t do anything for you. You didn’t get your turn, I—”

“You’ve been doing it for me,” Crowley mutters. “For 6,000 years.”

Aziraphale cuddles in tight under Crowley’s chin.

“Crowley, darling,” she breathes with a hitch. “… What if we only have five more to go?”

Crowley wraps her arms around the angel.

“Well, then we’ll just have to love like the humans do,” she says into Aziraphale’s hair. “Like any day might be the last.”

There was a conjunction of Venus and Jupiter that year, on this night, that an angel and a demon joined together.

In astrology, Jupiter can denote the eternal search for truth, and risk-taking. Jupiter smiles on those who ask questions.

You probably already know what Venus rules.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Dedicated, also, to everyone who read the original short and wanted more.
> 
> xx [siliconealien](http://siliconealien.tumblr.com)


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